The origin of Monsters: Dragons

The origin of Monsters: Dragons

People have always been fascinated by Dragons. You know those giant fire breathing warm blooded scaled super lizards. But where do they come from and why are they extinct. In many cultures, the dragons are predominant. Some are long and hairy. Others are fat and unable to fly around. Others tend to have supernatural powers over nature and shoot lighting. But what all of them have in common is that they are giant lizard monsters that terrorize humans. But fear not, I shall unmask these behemoths and show you readers the true identities of these fires breathing monsters.





One cannot star talking and unmasking dragons without speaking of the different kinds and their endemic regions of origin. The first depiction of dragons appears in the ancient Sumerian mosaics and reliefs. The story goes that the God Marduke beat the living sh#$it out his mother. Using her bodily parts he set the heavens and the earth, using her bones to keep the heavens on top. The rain that falls from time to time is the blood dripping from the dead dragon. So from this dragon’s death the world was created.

Next is the Norman Nighogg dragon son of the Frost Giant Loki. He is described as a giant long black serpent monster. His mouth and nails are has razor sharp. Ironically, this dragon is a vegetarian.  The story goes that this specific dragon is always eating always at the foundation of the world (or the roots of the life tree Ygrisill). Once he finally eats away at these roots the world will return to chaos thus returning to its original immaterial form. Thus, the dragon brings Doomsday.

The Anglo –Saxon dragon appears in the epic poem of Beowulf. In this story, Beowulf failed to kill Grendel’s mother. He instead slept with the woman demon and thus gave birth to a golden dragon. His father died killing it but then his best friend hooked up with the demon chick and the cycle of monsters kept on and on.  Well this dragon appears at the time that in the Beowulf story Christianity was introduced. Thus, this dragon was adopted from the Christian bible.


In the western Israelite culture that is the one derive from the Hebrew bible also has several predominant dragons. The first one is the red serpent dragon that caused the fall of man. This dragon convinced the woman to eat of the forbidden fruit. Some outside Jewish literature revolving this dragon states that this dragon was deprived of his arms, wings and legs for his evil act. Thus, this mighty beast became like any regular old serpent. According to Kabala, mysticism this serpent now lives wrapped around the tree of life munching on idiots that wonder in carelessly to the Garden of Eden.( bellow is Michelangelo's Fall of man from the Sistine chapel)

The second Dragon mention in the Hebrew bible is the White Cobra Dragon of Moses. He used it to defeat the tree headed red dragon of the Egyptian priest. Other Dragon from the Old Testament is the Leviathan that swallowed Jonah. The Chimera Dragons from the Merkevad (or god’s fancy Carriage) from the vision of Ezekiel.

In addition, there is the Dragon Bahamut that one time showed up in a battle against the Canaanites when the Israelites opened the Ark of the Covenant. Also, the Canaanites had an ice dragon name Baal. It was said that when the arc of the covenant was placed next to Baal statue Bahamut came out and had a battle royal with the Ice dragon. After, many fire and ice related casualties, caused by Bahamut and Baal, the Canaanites returned the Arc of the covenant.  Also according to Deutorononimo 32:33 The wine of the Canaanites is the poison of dragons(whatever that means).

The New Testament’s infamous Dragon is the 7 headed dragon from the apocalypse. This concept of the 7 headed dragon also appears in the Greek form of the Hydra. Thus, this dragon is in its true essence a Catholic version of a Hydra. Anyhow…the seven heads traditionally was understood as the seven deadly sins. However, this dragon was never identified as the Devil. The devil does play a role in doomsday but this vision is separate from that of the anti-christ(or Caesar Nero). It had 4 humanoid heads of a ram, ox, goat and serpent. The body was like that of a lion and the tail had a snake and it had four pairs of wings. Its tail was like a serpent.

The last one reminds us of the hydra. One must consider that many early Catholics lived in a Roman Greek society. Thus, in order to teach the Greeks they had to change their concepts of dragons and thus use the model of the hydra (both are spiky around the top) . You know the monster whose head re-grows all the time. Another kind of Greek dragon appears in the form of caduceus weapon of Hermes. This wand common that today is used as the medicine symbol feature the twin winged dragons of sleep and death. Hermes thus used it to produce both kinds of sleeps on mortals.

In the western world we have Damballah. This fancy serpent voodoo dragon is an export from the Nigerian Yoruba religion.  This fellow Damballah  is also predominant in Santeria. In both types of religion this Damballah appears as an agent of creation. In Voodoo he was the chauffeur of Olurumare. He would take him back and forth through earth as the creator god shaped the world. now Damballah is wrapped around the earth keeping it in the form of a solid perfect sphere. Oh and FYI his poop is said to have formed the mountains. In the other, form he is called Obatala and he simply was a Dragon that saw how the Olofi made the world. Anyhow…in both form he is simple a flying giant serpent that knows a lot.  And is also the prime reason for one finding a snake in a bucket in at the voodoo and Santeria temples.

From the Americas, we get the fancy Thunder bird Dragon Quetzalcoatl. He appeared in the form of a feathered lizard that spitted lighting.  The legend goes that he was tricked by his evil brother to give him temporary command of the dumb humans. For that reason, the evil gods always demand blood for it is the only thing that their kind lacks. They say that in 2012, the Thunder dragon will return and kick his evil brother out and the last sacrifice will be that of the evil gods.

In Japan, we have the Yamato the heavenly dragon. Yamato was one of the four guardians of china. In china …dragons appear often…you know long and snake like. These kinds are found in rivers and in heave and lack wings. Their faces have whiskers like catfishes. In essence they are hybrids of snakes and cat fishes. In India, we have the fancy ride of Indra. In the Vedic songs(written around the 2000 BC) Indra appears on top of a flying lightning shooting dragon. He was in all respect the first dragon knight.

In Egypt we have the Winged Dragon Ra. It is a mal translation to refer to this dragon as the winged dragon of Ra when in all reality Ra is the dragon. He represents the sun and is the son of the dead god Osiris and the Law giver Isis. He basically, appears like a man with the head of falcon. At other times he appears like a giant falcon with the pharaoh crown. Well, in any case he brings life and spits fire

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In Australia, we have the Komodo dragons. Those dragons actually exist. They weighs 400 pounds and its bite its extremely poisonous.  Please refrain from trying to become a dragon knight for one of them.

My personal favorite is the Feral Dragon. This little critter appeared in the story of Merlin. This one was a fat and had small chicken legs. It spitted smut instead of fire. They only attacked if humans had hatred in their hearts. Otherwise they were as harmless as kitty cats.

I shall not dwell on the subject of modern dragons. Since all these eloquent magic user dragons are based on the dragons mentioned above. Well, the dragons like the ones in the bible, Valhalla, and the Greek Caduceus (the staff or tree that has a twin snakes or dragons wrapped around it) center around the tree iconography and the serpents. Both kinds of symbol represent the renewal of life. Thus, the tree of life and the dragons where just exaggerated forms of the only contact those humans had with eternity. These cave men believed that trees and serpents where eternal. You must consider the regenerating powers of trees and how they are constantly withered and renewed as the season pass. The same goes for the serpents shedding of skin. This becomes more apparent in the Babylonians’ epic of Gilgamesh. He obtained a root that would make him forever young but a snake ate it.  Anyhow, dragons in this sense are Deified snakes.

Dragons like Damballah and Marduke’s mother simply serve as a supporting structure of the earth. This is derived from exaggerated forms of earth worms. By observing how these worms created nutrients for the ground in time these men came to regard the serpent monsters as gods. Both wrap themselves around the world and keep it from falling into chaos.

As for Indra, his dragon only serves a fancy drive…to create an effect. Anyhow, snakes where held in high rewards in India ( as a symbol of wisdom and eternal youth) . The earth god had an earth worm. Vishnu had a blue cobra. And thus Indra the god of the heavens had a flying dragon serpent.

As for Ra and Quetzalcoatl, both stood for the predominant element and anime. For Ra, it was common to have a lot of sun in the desert region. The falcon was the only predatory bird that could survive in that harsh climate. In the jungle there was hundreds and thousands of birds called Quetzal and evil looking snakes. His going away has to with the Aztec related extinction of the Quetzal bird that was used for everything. The lightning has to do with the terrible hurricanes that used to plague the region.

Well, here you have the official answer. In my perspective dragons are dinosaurs’. Let me explain, all these places have something in common gold and diamonds. All the dragons either are golden or sleep on top of gold or are found in caves. Anyhow, suppose that you are a stupid miner in year one and then you find underground the head of a T-Rex. The closets reference thing that looked like Dinosaurs for the ancients was birds and lizards.  So then you fuse the super old with common household things and then you have dragons. Thus, in a weird fashion Charles Darwin killed the dinosaurs’ by bringing them down to earth.

So folks, here you have our dinosaurs …I mean dragons.

Here are the Other Monster Blogs:

 http://www.phistars.com/2011/09/origin-of-monsters-dragons.html
http://www.phistars.com/2011/09/origin-of-monsters-elf.html
http://www.phistars.com/2011/09/zombietology-their-origin-and-creation.html
http://www.phistars.com/2011/09/origin-of-monsters-vampires.html
http://www.phistars.com/2011/09/origin-of-monsters-werewolf.html